Anyone who attended last year’s Women’s March will tell you the march itself was just the starter pistol — the signal to hit the pavement in the long race toward progress.

It was the largest protest in U.S. history, and it continued well past Jan. 21. In the number of women exploring bids for elected office. In the #MeToo movement. In the phone calls to representatives. In the hours volunteered. In the conversations whispered and shouted.

The second annual Women’s March takes place Saturday, against a landscape that feels both unimaginable and … exactly what we imagined. Pundits will parse the turnout, the posters, the speakers, the reaction in hopes of quantifying the march’s power and relevance.

Fine. But its power lies, above all, in the movement launched one year prior — a movement that ebbed and flowed, in fits and starts, as social movements always do.

Consider the past 12 months, punctuated with moments that remind us why millions marched last January, what happened as a result and why their work is nowhere near finished.

In no particular order ...

Elizabeth Warren persisted.

Maxine Waters reclaimed her time.

San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz, armed with a bullhorn and waders, set out to save her island and its people in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. President Donald Trump labeled her “nasty.”

U.S. Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) asked why men should fund prenatal care.

“Wonder Woman” became the highest-grossing superhero origin movie of all time.

“Girls Trip” became the first comedy of the year to gross $100 million.

Serena Williams became a mother, prompting speculation that her career was over. (The 1950s called. They want their gender norms back.)

Bill O’Reilly was forced out at Fox News after a series of sexual harassment allegations.

President Trump retweeted a GIF that showed him clocking Hillary Clinton in the back with a golf ball.

Harvey Weinstein was revealed to be an alleged serial predator who abused his position of power to harass and assault women in and around Hollywood for decades.

Kevin Spacey, James Toback, Brett Ratner, Louis C.K. — and then some — joined him in disgrace.

Women shared their #MeToo stories en masse, a continuation of the work begun decades earlier by Tarana Burke, who launched a nonprofit in 1997 to help victims of sexual harassment and assault and named her movement “Me too.”

Hundreds of women signed an open letter alleging rampant harassment in Illinois politics.

More than 25,000 women contacted the Emily’s List political action committee about running for elected office.

Athletes, from swimmer Diana Nyad to gymnasts Aly Raisman and Simone Biles, shared stories of alleged sexual assault at the hands of their coaches or team doctors.

Time magazine declared “silence breakers” the Person of the Year for 2017.

In the speech of a lifetime, Oprah Winfrey declared “a new day is on the horizon,” leaving Golden Globes viewers cheering in their living rooms across America.

President Trump, in a discussion about immigration reform, asked why we’re opening our borders to people from “shithole” countries. And if that amoral ranking of human worth, that willingness to turn a blind eye to human need, that utter disbelief in the equality of all people and that complete misunderstanding of our country’s core principles don’t justify marching in the streets, I don’t know what does.